


Mirror Mirror

by whoistorule



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV), Schneewittchen | Snow White (Fairy Tale)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-10
Updated: 2013-11-10
Packaged: 2018-01-01 00:26:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1038171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whoistorule/pseuds/whoistorule
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>She had never been a princess, for princesses are born, but Queens are built, and she had built herself well, with an armored heart and a gilded smile.  Her beauty was cruel kind; she would not tame wild beasts, nor call fawns to a glen.  Princesses melted hearts, but Queens stole them and locked them away, for they knew hearts were where they were weakest.</i>
</p>
<p>--</p>
<p>Cersei Lannister Snow White AU.  A companion piece of sorts to my Sansa Stark Little Red Riding Hood AU, <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/504002">"Gentle Wolves Should Beware the Woods"</a>.  Written for the lovely Fran, who demanded twincest of me on pain of death.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mirror Mirror

**Author's Note:**

  * For [houselannister](https://archiveofourown.org/users/houselannister/gifts).



There were nights when the moon hung low and yellow, stealing the sun’s gold to cast latticed shadows upon her many-mirrored room.  Those nights were her favorite. In the tawny light, the Queen would stand, watching as a thousand thousand Warriors stared back with her same-green eyes, her same-blonde hair, her same-proud smile.

Every night she would stare at her mirror, whispering her secrets, but on those nights, the mirror whispered back.

_Mirror mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?_

\--

Of course, she wasn’t always a Queen.  Before she was Queen, she was a girl, one with a fiery beauty, the type that burned to the touch.

(She had never been a princess, for princesses are born, but Queens are built, and she had built herself well, with an armored heart and a gilded smile.  Her beauty was cruel kind; she would not tame wild beasts, nor call fawns to a glen.  Princesses melted hearts, but Queens stole them and locked them away, for they knew hearts were where they were weakest.)

There was a witch-woman, a fortune teller of the basest kind, who once a season would make camp in the murk and grime at the base of the Rock on which she lived, a witch-woman who she was prohibited to see, but the girl-who-would-be-Queen had lion’s pride; she would not be forbidden.  Down the rock she snuck, when the sun’s bright had faded to ripples of amber, she crept to the witch-woman’s tent. 

_Lion-girl, queen-to-be, do you come to see how your story ends?_ It was as if the woman whispered, but she could not see her lips moving, nor hear the words aloud.  They seemed to echo, instead, from within her chest.

“I’m not afraid of you,” she roared, for she wasn’t.  “You’re nothing but an old hag who lies to sailors for a bit of bread.”

_That I may be, for bread is more precious than gold when you are starving._ The witch-woman cackled, and it was a hollowing sound, one that shook the Queen-to-be from within.  _Their price is bread, and their fortunes pleasant, but you’re here for more than crumbs and lies, and for that, you’ll pay a much higher price.  Or do you not wish to see the crown that will rest upon those golden curls?_

She shuddered, for the witch-woman spoke true.  Though her words were proud, her heart ached to see what lay in store.

_For your future, I will take a piece of your soul.  Not all, don’t you worry, just a piece.  Half will do nicely._

“Half?”

_Half._   _You will still have plenty left with which to live._

“Do I need it?  That half of my soul?”

_Need?  Why of course not, but I’ll tell you what.  I’ll lock up that half for you, and keep it safe, somewhere where you can keep an eye on it._ Again, the witch-woman cackled, and the very rock itself seemed to shake with the sound.  _That’s the price, Queen-to-be, half your soul for all of your future._

Half her soul seemed a fair price to pay to know what was to come, and firmly once, twice, the girl nodded.

The witch-woman’s nails pressed into her chest, lightly at first, and then harder, until the pain was excruciating, ripping and tearing and hollowing her out, until suddenly it was over.  Before her was a green-glass mirror framed in gold so bright it seemed to shine on its own.  The witch-woman had vanished, and the world with her, but as if from far, far away, the girl-who-would-be-Queen heard a sickly, wavering voice speak.

“Now look, Lioness, look into the glass and see what your future holds.”

\--

Green and gold, the mirror followed the girl wherever she went, for she refused to be parted from it for even an instant.  Magic though the mirror was, she could will it’s shape to whatever it need be.  Most days, it rested close to her breast, safe within a golden locket with a lion’s face, and when it was quiet she would swear she could feel it beat against her chest, a twin heartbeat in rhythm with her own.

For hours and hours she would gaze into it, at the mysteries within, and the horrors, and of course, the man, her secret twin, her stolen soul. 

But life outside the mirror marched on.  As soon as her beauty settled on her widening hips, her father sold her to a crowned beast, a man who grunted like a boar but wore the mantle of a kingdom upon his brutish shoulders, a man who had loved once and lost his love to the wrath of a dragon far far away, a man whose fingers left purpling gifts on her pale skin, and the hot stench of stale wine upon her lips.

When she awoke, there was blood between her thighs that was not her own, and a boar on her marriage bed, shards of mirrored glass coming off of his ample stomach like porcupine quills.

The Queen rose from her bed well satisfied, for beasts are made for a purpose, and hers had served his well.  Her golden hair was streaked scarlet and it blew against her goosepimpled skin, naked but for the locked that beat against her breast, and she smiled her own secret smile.  The Queen didn’t have to open her mirror to know that the smile of man who lay within was the twin of her own, cruel and easy and hungry.

\--

The realm mourned a king they never knew, and beneath her widow’s wail the Queen wore blood-red linen, for she’d had a dress stitched of her stained wedding sheets, her victor’s cloak, the skin of her slain beast.  His seven-sided tower, which had once held the spoils of his hunts, she claimed as her own.  There she planted her soul and watched it grow to fill the room, each wall glinting with green glass but for one, the westward window that faced the sea and let through the light which brightened her half-soul’s handsome face.

The day the witch-women stole half her soul from her breast, the Queen was made half-empty, and each day she hungered anew.  She yearned for power, though she wore ermine and velvet against her soft skin and the king’s gold upon her tresses, his advisors fought her at every turn.  But there was more that she wanted than power alone.

The witch-woman had cursed her with knowledge, with sight, and with a hunger bone deep that could not be denied, for she gave and she took at all once, for behind the mirrored glass lay the future the witch-woman foretold, a curtain of red hair, eyes deep and blue as ice melt pools, and skin pale and white as winter’s snow.

_Queen you shall be,_ spoke the voice of a woman and the voice of the Warrior, but rather than the witch-woman’s cackle, it was always her own voice she heard, though her lips never moved, _until there comes another, younger and more beautiful, to rip away everything you hold dear._

Each time she gazed upon her lost-half-soul, she could hear the words echo, and yet she could not bear to be parted from the Warrior, for he was her and she him, and only with him could she truly be whole.

The hunger that gnawed the Queen from within, that hollowed her out and sucked her dry, was for the power not to rule just the land beneath her feet and the people below her rock, but fate itself, to bend it to her will, to steal back what had been once stolen from her when she was too young to know what a soul was worth.

_The girl was the key; she had to eliminate the girl._

\--

And who was the girl?  Not the beast’s daughter, for though he was plentiful in planting his seed, his daughters were base as not fit to rival her beauty.  No, she came in the shape of a ward, the daughter of the beast’s battle-brother, orphaned and over-awed by the majesty of the Queen’s castle. 

“Thank you, your grace, I don’t know where I would have gone or what I would have done without you.”  When she spoke, the Queen could hear songbirds on her lips.

“Why of course, little bird.  I would not have one as soft as you begging on the streets.  Think of this palace as your home.”  Honey sweet were her words, ringing through the cavernous throne room, and with red-clawed fingernails, she clasped the girl’s frozen chin, tilting it towards her.  “All except the tower.  That is mine alone.”

“Yes, your grace.”  Her curtsy was deep, her hair rippling like blood to the cold floor, and the Queen shuddered.

“So young,” the Queen whispered, sweeping her fingers against the girl’s hair, “To have suffered so much.  Your heart must be so heavy.  Don’t you worry, little bird, I will protect that heart, I will keep it safe.”

Safe it would be when the Queen had it ripped from her chest and locked in a box.  A cold dagger through the girl’s warm breast till her blood spilled across the snow pretty as her glinting hair and all her problems would slip away.  It was that simple.  All she needed was a hound.

\--

The moon hid her face that night, but the stars were pregnant with heavenly light, drawing patterns in the navy sky, but the Queen was blind to them.  Her lidded eyes saw only the Warrior.  In her mirrors, he was naked as she, and when she slipped her sharp tipped fingers between her hungering thighs, it was his hands she felt.

The Queen’s breath came heavy but her heart was light.  The girl was in her grasp, and her plans would not fail.  Her soul would be whole and her future murky once more when the girl’s heart lay still beating in her open hands.

Her twin, her half-soul, came as she did, his smile wide, his golden hair gleaming.  So focused was the Queen on her own pleasure that she did not see the flash of red behind him, fleeing, bright against the white snow.

\--

“Gone? What do you mean she’s gone!  She can’t be gone!”

“She left by night your grace, slipped away into the forest.” Her Hound was scarred and ugly, blackened by the mercy of a crueler dog than he, but his daggers were sharp and he wore her colors, and he bore no love for pretty young girls.

“Well then you must find her, of course.  Find her and rip out her heart and bring it back to me.”

He nodded, his lips snarling and cruel.

“Here.”  The Queen drew shard of mirrored glass from her breast pocket.  In its depths, blood red hair flew by stark trees.  The Hound’s eyes raised, but he said nothing.  “Use this to carve it from her pale chest.  Do it by nightfall, and return to me.”

He nodded once and was gone.

\--

A heart he brought her, red and dripping, and the Queen smiled, but she felt no different.  Her mirror showed her no sign of the girl, but the heart did not beat in its gilded box, and the Queen hungered still.

“Why?” Her fists beat against the mirror, “My death’s heart lies in my possession and yet I feel nothing.”

Cold and impassive as a god, her mirrored twin said nothing at all.  Fog clung to his perfect skin, grey and heavy until she could see nothing but him.  His silence mocked her, his perfection stung.  She needed him, and yet he would not speak.

“Why do you not answer me!”  Glass shattered against her fist, drawing red pinpricks to her skin, which was golden in the lamplight.

_Younger and more beautiful,_ a voice echoed from afar, _she will take away all you hold dear._

“How can she when I hold her heart in my hands!  How can she when there is no life beating in her breast!  How can she when she lies dead upon the snow!”

In the mirrors, the Warrior bled with her, scarlet staining the glass from within and without.

\-- 

When the moon hung yellow once more, the fog lifted and the Queen saw.  She saw the girl, her bright hair darkened with soot and ash.  There was no gash across her chest, for it was not her heart that lay hugged by velvet and gold, locked in her mirrored room.  The girl was alive, and her Hound had lied.  Her fate still taunted her, and the witch-woman’s cackle echoed from the past.

“Mirror mirror,” she whispered, “What will I do?”

“What else can you do?”

“If my Hound won’t hunt, I will kill her myself.”

Her smiled his Warrior smile, and the Queen’s heart beat heavy in her chest.  Come the sun’s break, she would fly, and when it sunk again beyond the sea, the girl would die.

\--

The mirror built her a guise, ugly and old, with birthing scars, and cruel red lines that stretched upon her peerless skin.  Upon her head where gold locks once flowed bright as the sun’s rays, she was bald, a haggard mother, not a peerless queen, but the Warrior thought her beautiful still, and it was enough. 

Enough for her to walk without shame through the city’s streets.  Enough for her to fly through the forest scarring her naked feet, running wild, not caring where the brambles tore her clothes and skin, streaking her with browning blood. 

The girl hid on a mountaintop, and so the Queen climbed, with the sun beating down upon her wrinkling back, the mirror hanging heavier against her chest with every step she rose.  At last her feet found purchase on the stony peak, where a wooden door was carved into the girl’s eagle’s nest. 

“Won’t you let me in?”  When she spoke, it was the witch-woman she heard, her shaking voice coming through the Queen’s own heat-chapped lips.  “For I am old, and I wish only for a drink of water.”

“Of course,” The girl sung out, her voice sweet and warm as mulled wine, “Please come in and rest a while.”

The Queen sat on a gnarled wooden stump, scoffing as the girl turned her back.  Against her chest, her mirror, her half-soul, grew sharp and long, it’s edges pricking against her bare chest.

Beneath the dust veil she wore, the Queen could see glimmers of blood-red in the girl’s hair.  “You’re so young,” she whispered. The girl’s eyes were icy blue and clear as a mountain spring.  “And so beautiful.”  Her skin was white and pale as the winter’s first snow.

Grasping her mirrored dagger, the Queen rose, her guise falling as its locket chain broke against her neck.  With each step she took towards the girl, she could feel her image change.  Smooth and ageless was her skin, and gold her hair, brushing her unlined cheeks.  The Queen’s eyes were green as the glass she held, and her smile cruel.  In her chest, a lion roared, hungry as she rose above her prey.

“Mirror mirror in my hand,” the Queen’s voice was but a murmur, for she would not see the girl turn until the last, would not startle the girl away,  “Who will be the fairest in the land?" 

_She will rip away all you hold dear._

The dagger tore flesh, carved a hole heart-deep, and her fingers wrenched the heart free, but when the Queen’s eyes opened, it was her own heart she held, warm and beating fast in her shaking palm.

The girl’s cries echoed in the cavernous room, but the Queen could hear nothing but the witch-woman’s laugh and the shatter of a mirror against the stone. 

A thousand thousand green eyes blinked back at her through the shards of glass.  One by one they melted away, until all that was left was the dagger in her chest, her soul’s marred halves coming together at last as her blood spilled scarlet from her chest, streaking her skin and her hair as the life left her body. 

And she laughed, and the mirror laughed with her, their voices ringing out in twin harmony, her dying flesh drinking in the sun’s gold, bright against the blood that painted her skin.

The Queen knew now what the witch-woman gave her was not a curse at all, but a gift.  Twin souls wedded in death, for the Warrior and the Queen were one and the same. 

_Mirror, mirror._


End file.
